Arkansas Blog

Friday night lights

Checking in late after a nearly interminable Oscar-nomined movie, "There Will Be Blood." I'm no movie reviewer. I'm just an average guy. Daniel Day Lewis chewed up some scenery, as the film jocks say, but it was mostly tedious for me.

But I did have a fine hamburger and Caesar salad at Zuni Cafe and I'm going to plunge into Japantown shortly.

Make your own music, if you're still up.

Meanwhile, let me just say: Judge Robert Dawson in Fort Smith sent a message to the whole world today -- it was all over every SF TV channel -- that rich people really ARE different than you are me. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. Outrageous, a second free ride for a multi-millionaire. Bob Balfe better appeal again.

IN OTHER NEWS:Sheffield Nelson will have to tweak his severance tax proposal. The attorney general said his revenue split, between colleges and highways, is a little ambiguous as written. That's no shocker. I still think Nelson will settle for an all-highways tax, just as long as the rate is fair enough. In other words, not just window dressing. Bring on the initiative, I still say.

Judge Tim Fox dismissed Jim Parson's lawsuit over Mike Huckabee's destruction of thousands of dollars worth of state computer hard drives. There MIGHT have been a claim here with a real lawyer at work. Parsons is still pursuing a very interesting Freedom of Information claim from which -- again with a good lawyer -- Arkansas could get some good law overturning the standing practice of claiming that every piece of paper generated in a governor's office is a "working paper" and the governor's to take away for his own private safekeeping or destruction. I think that's an overly broad view of the law and on what constitutes a working paper. But until there's a serious lawyer briefing this case, it will likely remain the way it is. Nutball Jim isn't likely to change the status quo.

Finally, Obama is closing the gap in many states (enthusiasm in California is very high) but sounds like Bill Clinton is still a brother in Arkansas.

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